Fed-up politicos, flying the coop

HARRISBURG - Lisa Bennington made up her mind to end her nascent political career while on vacation last month, perched in a treehouse in Belize, trying to shoo away tarantulas.

Why that precise moment, the Pittsburgh legislator can't fully explain. But her reasons for leaving her new job - a job she feverishly fought to land - are clear and cutting and she isn't holding back.

After only one term, frustrated and disillusioned, the 31-year-old divorce lawyer will leave the state House of Representatives, an institution she now describes as a dysfunctional family where good ideas go to die.

"I told myself that if it was as awful as everyone made it out to be that I would only do it for one term," she said.

It was worse, she said.

Bennington is among 24 incumbents in the General Assembly who have decided to give up their seats, a number of them, newcomers and veterans alike, echoing her frustration over the failure to pass important legislation in what was supposed to be a new era of reform.

"It's been an awful year in terms of governing. I don't see it getting better," said Rep. Ron Raymond (R., Delaware), who is leaving after 26 years in the House. "Nothing is moving. The machine is clogged."

Where once retiring lawmakers bowed out quietly, now they are openly criticizing the General Assembly, even going so far as to issue press releases voicing their discontent.

Rep. Carl Mantz (R., Lehigh), a freshman lawmaker like Bennington who ran on a campaign of reform, said earlier this month that he would leave.

Mantz, who declined to comment for this article, issued a press release saying he was "frustrated with the lack of meaningful progress on the reform front."

Even one of the legislature's champions of reform, Rep. David Steil (R., Bucks) is bailing out, saying he is discouraged by the General Assembly's failure to embrace change even after voters so clearly said they wanted it when they booted two dozen incumbents from office in 2006.

Efforts to expand public access to state records and limit campaign donations and spending by lobbyists have gone nowhere in Harrisburg.

"I am very disappointed that my colleagues on both sides of the aisle don't share my sense of urgency on this stuff," said Steil, who cochaired the Speaker's Reform Commission this year and who plans to devote his time to a company he formed that makes environmental monitoring equipment.

Among the members interviewed, Bennington is unusually candid in her harsh critique of Harrisburg.

"I don't feel that one voice makes a difference when the House is 203 people," said Bennington, a Democrat, who in 2006 knocked off a longtime incumbent with her campaign to change Harrisburg. "It's too big for one person to make a difference."

She came into office vowing to shake up the "old-boy club" atmosphere and was struck head-on, she says, with numbing partisanship at every turn.

It is not just reform issues that have gone nowhere.

The legislature has failed to limit gun sales, ban smoking in public places, or require hospitals to provide sexual-assault victims with emergency contraception despite widespread public support for each proposal.

"When something needs to be done because there is a mandate to do it, then it gets done and done quickly," Bennington said. "But when the people say they want something done, we keep waiting."

Rep. Josh Shapiro (D., Montgomery) said he shared the frustration voiced by members of his caucus. But he said major policy initiatives, such as the ones Bennington mentioned, will likely not get enough votes to pass until key reform measures are enacted.

"We can't get 102 votes on health-care packages because we don't have campaign finance reform," said Shapiro, who cochaired the reform commission with Steil. "We still have special interests controlling the debate instead of lawmakers addressing the needs of their constituents."

G. Terry Madonna, a political professor and pollster at Franklin & Marshall College, said new legislators who rode a wave of reform into Harrisburg in 2006 had not yet taken advantage of their numbers.

"They are potentially a huge force, but they don't know how to harness that power," he said.

Longtime Harrisburg activist Gene Stilp has a more pointed view.

"They forgot why the voters sent them here," said Stilp, who heads the public interest group Ratepayers and Taxpayers United. "They forgot their mission."

In 2006, 31 House and Senate incumbents departed the Capitol - a 30-year high - amid voter anger over the legislative pay raise a year earlier.

With two dozen incumbents opting out this year and possibly more joining their ranks as candidates begin collecting signatures on nominating petitions this week, the balance of power - particularly in the House - is at stake.

Though few expect Republicans, who dominate the Senate 29-21, to lose control of that chamber, Democrats cling to a 102-101 edge in the House.

The roster of retirees, however, appears to favor Democrats.

Of the 19 representatives who have decided to leave the House, 12 are Republicans. Several of them represent districts where the majority of voters are Democrats or where recent voting patterns favor that party.

Top campaign officials for both parties say running for office during a presidential election year bodes well for them.

"We have safe Democratic seats in the southwest that we will have no problem defending, and in the southeast a preponderance of Republicans are retiring in an area that is transitioning from red to blue," said Rep. Dan Frankel (D., Allegheny) cochairman of the House Democratic Campaign Committee, who thinks the Democrats will pick up three or four seats.

Rep. Mike Turzai (R., Allegheny), chairman of the House Republican Campaign Committee, is likewise optimistic.

"There is no seat on the Republican side that we concede. Not one," he said. "There is a real opportunity here for us. We are only down one vote and there are many places to pick up seats."

One district where the GOP will struggle to retain control is in Northeast Philadelphia, the seat that retiring Rep. George Kenney held for 24 years.

Kenney initially decided not to seek reelection in 2005, but he ran again at the urging of GOP colleagues who believed that without him the heavily Democratic Northeast Philadelphia district would change party hands.

Despite similar pleadings this year, he decided to call it quits. Kenney, who won the seat when he was 27, says it's simply time to move on.

"I wanted to leave as a young man," said Kenney, who will be 51 when his term ends in November. "At some point you just know it's time to pursue other opportunities, or at least find out what is out there for you."

Representatives

George Kenney (R., Phila.)

David Steil (R., Bucks)

Arthur Hershey (R., Chester)

Carole Rubley (R., Chester)

Ron Raymond (R., Delaware)

Daylin Leach*

(D., Montgomery)

Tom Tangretti

(D., Westmoreland)

Jerry Nailor (R.,Cumberland)

Steven Nickol (R., York)

Thoms Yewcic (D., Cambria)

Edward Wojnaroski

(D., Cambria)

Bob Bastian (R., Somerset)

Lisa Bennington

(D., Allegheny)

Carl Mantz (R., Lehigh)

Fred McIlhattan (R., Clarion)

Steven Cappelli*

(R., Lycoming)

Sean Ramaley* (D., Beaver)

Thomas Petrone

(D., Allegheny)

Jess Stairs (R., Fayette)

* - running for state Senate

Senators

Connie Williams

(D., Montgomery)

Roger Madigan

(R., Lycoming)

Gib Armstrong

(R., Lancaster)

Gerald LaValle (D., Beaver)

Terry Punt (R., Franklin)

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24: Number giving up their legislative seats.

427: Their combined years of legislative experience.

18: Average years in the legislature.

32: Most years served (Rep. Jess Stairs and Sens. Roger Madigan and Gib Armstrong).

2: Fewest years served (Reps. Lisa Bennington and Carl Mantz).

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